Buying a House December 2021 - June 2020 - Thoughts please

coachman12

This week's Spending Review has already been mentioned----it is an important event and one that you should not make decisions before it is announced. 
That aside, if you are SURE ( and perhaps you employers can give you a definitive answer if you tell them why you want to know) that you can work from home, it has to make financial sense to move from London to Gloucestershire.
If not, a move within London depends on where you want to be located-----are you happy about moving south of the river ? You have so many choices and so many factors that may affect your situation within the next 6 months or so------I don't think anyone can really help you with a decision which is full of imponderables and so many aspects which are for you, and you alone, to choose.
But I wish you every good luck; and if you have any more thoughts, post again and see if anyone on the Forum can come up with a more helpful set of comments. 

Sanne

I’m in the camp of buy when the right house at the right price at the time comes along.
We bought just over two years ago - lots of people said don’t, Brexit will cause a huge drop in prices. Well, so far it didn’t - and we’re now on under 75% LTV with a 5-year fix so a lot would need to happen to get into negative equity.
To the contrary - had we not bought and waited for more Brexit certainty we probably still wouldn’t own a property now with COVID, me having been furloughed since April etc. etc.

People who’ve bought in November  last year probably considered a lot of factors - but not that a pandemic would be just round the corner.  

Who knows what’ll happen next - I don’t think anyone can second-guess what happens in the next year, never mind what will happen in the years until you’re looking to sell... And either way - if the price of your property will go up by x% then so will the price of all the other properties in the same area. For larger houses that then means you actually need more money for the deposit so unless you want to take the money and not buy again it actually doesn’t matter...

davidmcn

You're never going to know whether you bought at the top or bottom of the market except in retrospect (and bear in mind the process typically takes months from whenever you start seriously looking anyway). If you postpone everything until next summer, what are you going to do if things are no more certain then? Postpone it again? You can drive yourself mad by trying to out-speculate everybody else.

Crashy_Time

Sanne said:

I’m in the camp of buy when the right house at the right price at the time comes along.
We bought just over two years ago - lots of people said don’t, Brexit will cause a huge drop in prices. Well, so far it didn’t - and we’re now on under 75% LTV with a 5-year fix so a lot would need to happen to get into negative equity.
To the contrary - had we not bought and waited for more Brexit certainty we probably still wouldn’t own a property now with COVID, me having been furloughed since April etc. etc.

People who’ve bought in November  last year probably considered a lot of factors - but not that a pandemic would be just round the corner.  

Who knows what’ll happen next - I don’t think anyone can second-guess what happens in the next year, never mind what will happen in the years until you’re looking to sell... And either way - if the price of your property will go up by x% then so will the price of all the other properties in the same area. For larger houses that then means you actually need more money for the deposit so unless you want to take the money and not buy again it actually doesn’t matter...

It was the VOTE for Brexit that was supposed to cause the house price crash (and the country went ahead and voted for it!) according to the Pro- Remain narrative, but we have not actually seen what Brexit will be like yet.

spoovy

mither_2 said:

If anyone else knows of any variable that we haven't considered then please let me know. 
A lot of what happens with our purchase could depend on luck but I want to try and make as educated a decision as possible.  

You've already listed enough variables to make it beyond your ability to assess.  

I'm in a similar situation to you and have spent years trying to understand the relevant factors so as to judge a best time to buy, but have just about given up. Seasoned professional economists get this stuff wrong practically all the time, so what chance do you or I realistically have? The system is just too complex, plus in this country the government can and will pull unexpected stunts that drastically change things at any time, so its not a properly functioning market anyway. 

Its incredibly frustrating to have to basically gamble on something so important but I'm reluctantly learning to accept the unavoidable reality of it.

Crashy_Time

Did you cover rising mortgage rates OP?

mither_2

coachman12 said:

This week's Spending Review has already been mentioned----it is an important event and one that you should not make decisions before it is announced. 
That aside, if you are SURE ( and perhaps you employers can give you a definitive answer if you tell them why you want to know) that you can work from home, it has to make financial sense to move from London to Gloucestershire.
If not, a move within London depends on where you want to be located-----are you happy about moving south of the river ? You have so many choices and so many factors that may affect your situation within the next 6 months or so------I don't think anyone can really help you with a decision which is full of imponderables and so many aspects which are for you, and you alone, to choose.
But I wish you every good luck; and if you have any more thoughts, post again and see if anyone on the Forum can come up with a more helpful set of comments. 

I can. the head of the department has already said he's going from 5 days in the office to 2 and he lives just outside London. I don't have anything in writing on this though. Even pre-Covid there were precedents of colleagues who lived in the north/Midlands only coming in 2 days a week or not at all sometimes. 
Less clear for my partner so not really an option. Something we may consider in 5 years time though. 
The other thing is that we still enjoy living in London and don't have children. Hopefully post C19 we'll be able to enjoy London again. 
  

mither_2

Crashy_Time said:

Did you cover rising mortgage rates OP?

This has occurred to us. We have a 25% deposit and so rates are relatively low. Once the fix expires could be more of a problem. 

mither_2

mither_2 said:

Crashy_Time said:

Did you cover rising mortgage rates OP?

This has occurred to us. We have a 25% deposit and so rates are relatively low. Once the fix expires could be more of a problem. 

But I would expect that the government can't raise rates significantly as so many people have such large mortgages. 

mither_2

spoovy said:

mither_2 said:

If anyone else knows of any variable that we haven't considered then please let me know. 
A lot of what happens with our purchase could depend on luck but I want to try and make as educated a decision as possible.  

You've already listed enough variables to make it beyond your ability to assess.  

I'm in a similar situation to you and have spent years trying to understand the relevant factors so as to judge a best time to buy, but have just about given up. Seasoned professional economists get this stuff wrong practically all the time, so what chance do you or I realistically have? The system is just too complex, plus in this country the government can and will pull unexpected stunts that drastically change things at any time, so its not a properly functioning market anyway. 

Its incredibly frustrating to have to basically gamble on something so important but I'm reluctantly learning to accept the unavoidable reality of it.

It is. 
I'm minded to go ahead with the purchase. Its a decent size house with a garden in nice street. Somewhere I'd be content for 5 years if needs be. If I've bought at the top of the market and it crashes I think I'll fare better than some of the very expensive flats I still see selling in zones 1-2.